You are here

Students Learn Healthy Lifestyle

NEW KNOXVILLE — Fourth through seventh graders learned about healthy eating, sleep and exercise from Joint Township District Memorial Hospital representative Joanne Winget Wednesday during a school health fair program.

Winget helped students plan a day of healthy eating.

“What do you’d think you’d want for a healthy breakfast?” she asked, teaching the students that bacon should be counted as a fat serving along with the butter on toast.

She showed the healthy plate model of eating, which recently replaced the food pyramid model.

A healthy plate, she explained, would be half-filled with fruits and vegetables.

After the students planned their eggs, bacon, apple, toast and milk breakfast, she talked about the importance of eating right before tests and moved on to asking about the amount and types of exercises students engaged in.

She suggested students exercise an hour every day. Students said their favorite exercises were the elliptical, lifting weights, and running.

She tried to lead students to discover the third and final component of healthy lifestyle on their own.

“Can you think of one more thing you can’t live without, besides food and exercise?” she asked.

“Rainbows,” said one student.

Sleep, she told him, was the third component, and students learned that nine hours per night was a good amount of time to sleep. They also learned about people, like nurses and police, whose sleep schedules are disrupted by work.

She invited them to think of the consequences for a worker who was sleepy, advising that it could lead to unclear thinking or decision-making. Those effects apply to students who miss their sleep as well, she said.